Mitsuko Akechi
is a shinobi from Sunagakure, the current jinchūriki of Shukaku, and the author's main protagonist in the Naruto Fanon canon storyline. She became a jinchūriki at birth and was initially shunned by the villagers who still retained animosity towards Shukaku, even after the events of the , but eventually managed to become part of the village's Anbu. As a shinobi of Sunagakure, Mitsuko works hard to protect her younger brother and the village overall from outside harm. Background Mitsuko is the first child of Shigeyori and Yorinari, both members of magnet-wielding Akechi Clan. Mitsuko's birth on October 22 coincided with the village's recapture of Shukaku, a tailed beast it had owned prior to the . As she was deemed compatible with the beast, it was sealed within her shortly after her birth and she became the beast's first female jinchūriki in the process. She was trained in ninjutsu by her mother until the birth of her brother and was then sent to the Sunagakure Academy. As a jinchūriki of Shukaku, Mitsuko was feared by many of her peers, whose parents had recounted the terrifying tales of the beast they knew from the past. For this reason, Mitsuko made no friends in the Academy and grew up resenting the beast inside of her as well as many of her fellow students. Deprived of major bonds, Mitsuko instead focused on caring for her infant brother, with whom she became very attached. Sometime prior to Mitsuko's tenth birthday, her parents were both killed in the line of duty during a mission to the Land of Mountains. It is believed they were ambushed by criminal elements, but little could be confirmed from the crime scene. Now orphaned, none in the villagers offered to take her or her younger brother in, due to their connection to Shukaku. Instead, the Sixth Kazekage, Bunbuku Chagama, set aside a room for the two in an apartment within the village where they could live in relative peace. There, Mitsuko, though young, was left to look after and care for her little brother all alone. For this reason, it took Mitsuko nearly five years to graduate from genin to chūnin. The young woman capitalized on her resentment for her fellow villagers and the One-Tail within her to grow her powers with the sole desire of keeping her younger brother safe and from having to endure the same loneliness she experienced. Bunbuku saw value in her strength and promoted her to the Special Investigative Task Force of the village's Anbu shortly after her brother joined the academy. Personality Despite her overall behavior as a result of being a jinchūriki, she is a sweet and gentle individual at heart. She is often depicted as cold, detached, and stoic in nature giving off an unsettling aura to those who are unaware of her true nature. She has a strong personality and is fiercely independent, outright refusing the aid of her tailed beast. Her superiors note that Mitsuko is a highly logical individual, hence her assignment to the ANBU. As a member of the Special Investigative Task Force, she investigates internal trouble within the village, such as murder, charges of corruption, and charges of conspiracy. Her sharp mind and lethal wit has given her a high success rate. She also deals in external affairs, such as investigating charges of assassination, kidnapping, and espionage. Because of her ruthless reputation in this capacity as well as her general skills as a shinobi, and status as a jinchūriki of Shukaku, Mitsuko has become feared as . Mitsuko's true nature is revealed when she is in the presence of her younger brother, Hikaru. Her saving grace, as a young jinchūriki, Hikaru became the pillar Mitsuko needed to root herself firmly in reality. Consumed by the desire to change the village, so that he wouldn't have to grow up as lonely as she had, Mitsuko vowed not only to protect Hikaru with her life but the village as well: seeing the village as the only means of proving Hikaru with a brighter future. His sole caregiver after their parents' deaths, Mitsuko cares tremendously for his well-being and safety above all others. The prospect of giving Hikaru a better future keeps Mitsuko dutiful to the village and desiring international peace whatever the cost. Ironically, though a powerful shinobi in her own right, and possessing a frightening reputation, Mitsuko possesses a tremendous sense of honor as a shinobi, so much so that the Kazekage himself has commented on it. She will never belittle an opponent and has been even known to praise her enemies' abilities in combat. Despite being a jinchūriki, and thus, in possession of great power, Mitsuko is a humble shinobi and has no sense of arrogance. On the contrary, she despises those who are prideful in themselves, particularly Shukaku who is prideful in its so-called . She responds to this situation in particular by denying Shukaku its protection and refuses to use it's sand-based abilities. Because of her logical mindset and the nature of her job, Mitsuko is almost always able to retain a clear head in battle. For the most part, she is calm and expressionless, save for the very few instances in which her target proved to be more skilled than she anticipated, at such a time she will reveal her genuine surprise. Even in those instances she is able to remain in control of her thoughts and emotions and does not lose her composure. Her experience in the Anbu has made her insightful and her experience as a jinchūriki also made her extremely empathetic to others who felt as she did, gradually leading to a shift in her personality as she entered adulthood: silently holding on to her to change the world for the broken and downtrodden. Appearance Though a jinchūriki generally feared by her fellow Sunagakure shinobi, Mitsuko's overall appearance isn't intimidating, save for her piercing eyes and the indigo mascara-like rings surrounding her eyes; a sign of her status as Shukaku's host. As a young girl, her appearance was significantly softer, and she was known to wear brighter colors. As an adult, Mitsuko is a petite young woman with murky turquoise eyes, pale complexion, and jet-black hair which hangs down to about the center of her back, whilst her bangs hang down to touch her shoulders. As a child, she wore this hair more freely and with little maintenance. Her standard attire consists of a formfitting black jacket, accented in maroon with matching maroon pants and a belt worn at a diagonal angle. In her Anbu attire, she wears a black cloak and a lion-like mask. Abilities Mitsuko is a highly skilled and talented shinobi whose abilities began to manifest at birth when she was determined to be compatible with Shukaku due to her clan's kekkei genkai: Magnet Release. Despite the prejudices against her as a jinchūriki, and her duties as a guardian for her younger brother, Mitsuko was able to achieve the chūnin rank by the age of 15 and a year later was made into a member of the Kazekage's Anbu. Unlike most shinobi from her village, and perhaps others, she is not fond of flashy ninjutsu with large effects, preferring to master the Hiden abilities of her clan and fight with intelligence and strategy instead. She has a strong foundation in taijutsu, kenjutsu, and assassination techniques as a result of this determination. As a jinchūriki, she has a poor relationship with her tailed beast, but maintains the beast's massive chakra reserves which have merged with her own over time. Due to Shukaku, her chakra has been noted to be particularly potent, though some have noted that it doesn't possess the darkness usually contained within tailed beast chakra and therefore their jinchūriki. As a shinobi who desires peace, she rarely engages in battle directly, and when forced to, does so out of self-defense or in defense of a comrade. Unless specifically directed to kill her target, or in the rare event that she feels cornered and there is no other way, she prefers to incapacitate her opponents rather than kill them outright. Ninjutsu Nature Transformations As a member of the Akechi Clan, Mitsuko possesses the genetic ability of Magnet Release. Her status as the jinchūriki of Shukaku gives her an even stronger connection to this elemental transformation, resulting in indigo mascara-like rings around her eyes, very similar to other of this nature transformation. She primarily uses this ability to preform her clan's secret technique: Hiden: Magnetic Domain Technique and its variants. With this technique, she can magnetize anything she touches directly and also anything she saturates with her chakra, thus allowing her to manipulate them. She can also create a repulsive magnetic field to grant her flight. Mitsuko describes her fighting style as a . All of her magnetic techniques have one trait in common: they magnetize anything that comes into contact with them, regardless of whether the target is magnetic or not, by generating a powerful magnetic field. According to Mitsuko, once her opponent is struck with one of her magnetic techniques and becomes magnetized, she can then kill the opponent in the follow-up attack by manipulating this newly created magnetic field. She has a variety of methods available to her in order to set up this strategy, such as striking the opponent with a flurry of magnetized shuriken which then pass on their magnetism to the next target. Anything that comes into contact with her Shield of Magnetism similarly becomes magnetized, allowing her to set up her strategy even while on the defensive. Overall, this strategy makes her a highly dangerous assassin. As Shukaku's jinchūriki, she also naturally possesses a predisposition for wind chakra. With this chakra Mitsuko can preform the Blade of Wind: an invisible sword of wind which can heavily mutilate her target in a quick and almost unstoppable manner — the perfect blade for a covert assassin. Summoning Technique Knowing the Summoning Technique, Mitsuko possesses a summoning contract with the shinobi "|鎌鼬|kamitachi}}. These weasels can then uses their enhanced animal senses to assist her on missions and also with assassinations. Possessing the Wind Release, these weasels can supplement her arsenal by supplying her with powerful cutting techniques as well as several long-ranged techniques. Each is also adept at the use of sickles in combat, further supplementing her weapon-based fighting style. Taijutsu Bukijutsu Jinchūriki Transformations Intelligence Plot Land of Craters arc Creation and Conception I was initially inspired to create Mitsuko due to a host of particularly strong-willed female characters that I had been engaging, either through television or literature, at the time. While creating her, I tried to think about what made these characters such impressionable female protagonists and what set them apart from damsels like Inoue Orihime and, at times, . Iconic characters such as from Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, from The Walking Dead, Amber from Darker than Black, and even some personal heroes, like and (whom Mitsuko strongly resembles). It was important to me to make her independent, self-determined, and not a victim of her own misfortune. Physically, Mitsuko takes her appearance from Re-L, the protagonist of the anime Ergo Proxy. I chose her character because she strongly resembles my favorite singer, Amy Lee of Evanescence. I even imagine her voice matching Lee's, as I find it fits her characters well. Her personality and subsequent backstory comes from my tendency to root for underdog characters (think or ) who are strong, silent, self-dependent, and are often understood either by their fanbase or, more often, the social circles that exist within the series they come from. Trivia * Mitsuko's name comes from , a general under the daimyō . Mitsuhide was from the of the . Mitsuko's parents, likewise, were named for and of the Toki clan. * Mitsuko's name (光子) roughly translates to "bright girl".